The Great Naturalists

by Robert Huxley

We owe a debt of gratitude to the great naturalists who described, experimented, and collected, who gave us the means to understand the natural world and the potential not only to exploit it, but also to conserve it. This book includes many who are well known, among them Aristotle, Linnaeus, and Joseph Banks, but it also includes Antony van Leeuwenhoek, who discovered bacteria, Nicolas Steno, who opened the door to the earth's geological past, and Mary Anning, "the princess of palaeontology."

Many whose lives are described here were great artists as well as naturalists, and the book is illustrated with beautiful and precise paintings and drawings of birds, animals, fossils, fish, shells, and rocks selected from the unparalleled picture archives and collections of the Natural History Museum, London, as well as other sources.

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